


Horrors in the Mansion

by gay4tae



Category: TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, Haunted Houses, Horror, Hurt, Inspired by The Haunting of Hill House, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Scary, Suspense, wow i suck at tagging
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-10
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2020-12-07 10:11:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20974178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gay4tae/pseuds/gay4tae
Summary: When an unlikely turn of events causes Kai to reunite with old friends on a summer vacation to a mansion Yeonjun's rich parents own, Kai quickly comes to realize that the surface on the outside is just a small glimpse of the real horrors that lies beyond the exterior of the Victorian style home. With a history that reveals more of its dark secrets, Kai is determined in venturing into the heart of the house to seek out the truth. And what he finds is more blood-curdling than the unearthly woods that comes alive at night.





	1. Quiet, Quiet

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This au has been in the back of my head for the longest I can remember so I'm excited to finally get this out! It was hard to find time to work on this bc of school but I'm just glad I finished writing the first chapter. It's really late rn and I have school literally in a few hours so I don't have more time to triple check for any grammatical errors or writing mistakes but I'll be sure to come back and thoroughly edit this when I have the time. Please enjoy!! <333

He is running. 

He doesn’t know exactly what or who he is running from, but he run because the darkness that looms over him is anything but inviting. The adrenaline that pumps through his veins helps to ignore the sharp pain of the branches that marks his face as he whips pass each one, heart pounding loudly in his ears. He barely register the blood that trickles down his face and the burning sensation in the back of his thighs as his only line of focus is getting away from the strong lure behind him, beckoning him to stop for a moment and be enveloped in its grasp. 

He does not stop. He tries to make his legs move faster than they already are but his feet sores in protest and muscles ache. 

As the trees begin to clear, a beacon of light appears in the far distance, helping to illuminate his surroundings better. Just ahead of him, he is able to vaguely make out a silhouette of a man. He pushes his body forward and speed up his movement in resoluteness. His steps falters just the slightest as he nears the stranger. The man had his back turned to him and even from a distance, he could tell something was strangely off about him. Although he couldn’t see his face, he could’ve sworn the stranger was familiar in a sense. The man then turned his body to face him, revealing his identity. 

His breath caught in his throat in an almost painful way and he almost stopped running completely but hastily picked up his speed again. He wanted to scream. He wanted to cry. He felt compelled to punch him, yet had an overwhelming urge to throw himself into his arms. 

When he stops in front of the man, he fights to control his heavy panting as he grabbed onto the man’s arms and looked him in the face, “What are you doing? We need to get out of here. It’s not safe.”

The man’s face twisted up in confusion as he carefully regarded the panic state he was in. He brings his arms up to grasp his elbows so that he, too, had a grip on the other.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of, Kai. You don’t need to run anymore.”

Kai shook his head hysterically and swallowed deeply before speaking again, “It’s dangerous out here, we need to go. _ Now _.”

He went to pull the man along with him to run deeper into the woods but found that he was stuck in place. He tries again but the man’s grip on him was reluctant in letting go. Kai notices that the beaming light behind the man began to dim and a darker aura was emitting out from the man in front of him. He tries again, pulling and yanking his arms back but it was no use. The grip on his arms was firm enough to rivet him to the spot.

Kai stills completely and swallows nervously. “What are you doing?”

“I told you,” the man’s eyes shone brightly under the moonlight and a sinister smile crawl its way to his face. His tone was soft but held a note of eeriness as he slowly said each word, “There’s nothing to be afraid of. You don’t need to run anymore.”

The words tumbled out of his mouth shakily, but his voice held firm as Kai said, “Let go of me.”

The man only responded by tightening his grip on him.

Kai winces at the pain and he is desperate at this point, pushing at the man’s shoulders, thumping his fists against his chest, and wriggling relentlessly trying to get away from him.

“Ow! You’re hurting me. I said, ‘let go’!”

The darkness he was running away from has finally caught up to him and now encircles him like a vast mist. He tries not to further panic and not let fear take control of his mind but his effort is quickly put in vain as dread slowly plagues his body like a sedative. When he starts to hear the intrusive voices in his ears, his body instinctively shook and his legs wobbled. He was practically drunk off of terror that was poisoning him from the inside out.

The voices grew louder in volume and the whispering in his ears became fierce and intense, almost as if they were angry but could not get out audible words in its seams of rage and fury. The voices emerged from all sides and his body trembled ferociously. He screwed his eyes shut and tried not to pay attention to the strong, heavy presence of the darkness that surrounds him.

The voices in his ears were all shouting things at once but he was only able to pick out a few words and phrases.

“Don’t upset her—”

“She will come for you—”

“Don’t hide, she will find you—”

“Run, and she’ll catch you—”

His heart was beating too fast in his chest and small whimpers escapes him as pure terror rose to the surface. He opens his mouth to scream but the only sound that could come out was muffled and strangled. It was as if his voice has been reduced to a whisper and his scream came out hoarsed and raspy.

He was suffocating and he needed to escape before he could pass out. 

_ No _. 

He _ wanted _ to pass out—to get out of his body so that he would no longer have to experience being in the position he was in. He would do anything to get the voices out of his head and be far, far away from the man holding him in place.

When he felt a panic attack beginning to creep its way up, the sound of an alarm noisily interrupts the voices in his head and he throws his eyes open to face a white wall. He recognized he is staring at the ceiling of his bedroom as he spots the familiar long crack that ran along the edge of the ceiling down to the wall in the corner of his eye.

Kai lies in his bed, hair sticking messily to his forehead and chest heaving up and down. He keeps his eyes on the ceiling, fearing that if he closes his eyes, the voices will come back and if he looked around his room, the man in his dream will appear again.

After finally getting rid of his paranoia, he sits up and turned his head at his nightstand to look down at the time that illuminated from his phone. He picks up the device with a shaky hand and brings him thumb to hover over the _ stop _button before pressing down on it, thus shutting the alarm off. His fingers still trembled as he sat his phone back in its place.

It was five in the morning and Kai knew he should start getting ready to leave for his flight as he hasn’t packed a single thing into his suitcase yet. Procrastinating on simple things like packing was one of the quirks of being a full time broke, art student.

He flops down onto his mattress as he soothes his forehead with one hand and closed his eyes. It was the fifth time this week that the same unpleasant dream started occurring. It was always the same unknown danger he was running away from. The same voices intruding his head. Sometimes, the same man would appear every now and then but other times his appearance was absent. The sick, twisted part was that the man was someone he knows. He hasn’t had much contact with him lately besides for the exchanging of holiday cards and liking each other’s posts on social media, so it was certainly strange for him to start appearing in his dreams out of nowhere.

He only ever started having these nightmares roughly about three weeks ago. It all started when an old friend from high school gave him a call and asked if he’d be interested in spending his vacation at a mansion his parents own, alongside their high school friends. It was to be a small high school reunion get-together sort of thing. A certain person he’s been avoiding, the same man from his dream, would be there too, but he decided at the last minute it’d be nice to see all of his old friends again. He refused to let his past history keep him away from catching up with his old friends.

After they had all separated after high school to pursue their own goals and individual dreams, the group of odd, unlikely friends haven’t had much contact or interactions with each other due to their busy life. It was hard to have everyone be at the same place at the same time, especially when everyone lived so far from one another, so an opportunity like this was rare.

Still, it bothered him how the person he dreaded seeing kept appearing in his dreams ever since. _ It had to be a sign _ is what he keeps telling himself. _ But what? _

He finally throws the covers off of himself and get up to shower and prepare all his travelling essentials. It was going to be a long, exhausting flight.

Kai hadn't even realized that he had already forgotten what the voices from his dream was warning him about when he stripped off the clothes from his body and stepped under the blistering water that prompted a contented sigh out of him.

——

Perhaps it was the way the towering, naked trees seemed to stretch on endlessly and nearly covered the sky, causing most lights to be trapped through the branches. Though, something about it all raised a small, tiny, hardly noticeable red flag in his mind that he tried to suppressed further in the back of his head. 

_ This is going to be fun. _ He says in an attempt to cheer himself up. _ It’s just trees. Trees can’t hurt me. _

Kai finally brings himself to tear his eyes away from the forest to look ahead and see how close they were to his destination. There was even something off about the cab driver that Kai didn’t like one bit but chose not to voice his thoughts aloud for obvious reasons. He values his life more and didn't want to jeopardize that by offending a person who looked very much like he could drag his cold, dead corpse into the woods, mutilate him with a saw he had in the back of his trunk, and bury his remains without leaving a single trace of evidence. Luckily, they were just pulling up in front of the intimidatingly large structure that was a mansion and Kai sighed in relief at having finally arrived with his limbs still intact and his body in one piece.

Kai paid the cab driver and thanked him for his humble service before trying to haul his suitcase out of the trunk with minimum struggle. He barely had even slam the trunk closed before the cab took off like a rocket. 

After watching the cab get smaller and smaller into the distance, Kai finally turned his head to take a good look at the place where he’d be staying for the next month. Although it was more than a hundred years old, Kai still couldn’t help but to admire the Victorian style of the mansion that the renovators decided to still keep as part of the charm to the mansion. 

The mansion was bigger than anything he’d ever lived in and Kai still couldn’t believe he’s been friends with the son of multimillionaire parents. And he couldn’t even properly envy the guy because he wasn’t spoiled in the least and succeeded on his own being a well known fashion designer and global model without the help of his parent’s money or power. It was simply admirable.

Although they lived in two completely different worlds, they still managed to be close friends. So, instead of feeling jealous and envious of seeing the headlines of _ International Supermodel Choi Yeonjun _ on the front page of magazines or news articles, he’d feel a sense of overwhelming pride and admiration because he knew he deserved all the success he had.

Approaching the double doors to the front entrance of the colossal sized mansion, Kai brings his hand up and balled his hand into a fist before pausing in his movement and deciding to press the doorbell instead, thinking it’d be more efficient as the sound would be heard all throughout the house compared to his timid knock which is rathered considered pitiful. 

He only waited under a minute before the door swung opened in enthusiasm and a blue haired, several ears pierced fellow greeted him in the doorway. Kai hardly had gotten the chance to smile in greeting and say hello before he was being pulled in and enveloped into the warm embrace of the man’s arms.

“Oh my god, it’s so good to finally see you again. How do you still look so young? It’s like you’ve never aged a day in your life!” the man could barely contain his excitement as exuberance was practictially radiating from him.

Kai chuckled bashfully in response, “Look at _ you _, hyung. You’re a worldwide, international model. Basically sensational. Not to mention you even have your own clothing line. I’d support you by buying one of your products but I don’t think there’s anything I can afford from your brand.”

“Oh, enough about me. For the rest of my time here, I’m just the same person you used to remember me as before I’d hit the modeling and fashion world. Not Choi Yeonjun, the global supermodel, but simply Choi Yeonjun, your favorite eldest brother from another mother.”

Kai simply rolled his eyes playfully before switching the topic of the coversation, “Are the rest here already?”

“Everyone just got here recently actually. You’re the last one to arrive but just on time because they’re currently upstairs fighting over who get the master bedroom.”

Another chuckle escaped him as he looks around the interior of the place. “I feel like every room in this house is bigger than my entire apartment.”

“Come on. I’ll show you the bedroom corridors and then we got to round everyone up so we can properly celebrate our long overdue reunion with a glass or two of sparkling champagne.”

Yeonjun closes the door after Kai and he leads the way while giving the younger boy time to look around and adjust to the new environment. If there was a perfect way to describe how the inside of the mansion looked like, Kai would describe it as something you’d see in movies. There was a certain kind of a vintage feel to the place as the walls were covered over with wallpaper instead of being painted over and antiques were displayed in various places around the rooms. To get to the second level of the building, they had to walk up the grand staircase made of polished marble. Kai couldn’t help himself as he reached his fingers out to slide it against the equally polished, wooden handrail. 

When they got to the top, Yeonjun paused in his step momentarily just to point in the direction to his right.

“That way leads to the library, attic, private study room, and bathroom. This way…” he turned his body to the left, “-is where the bedroom corridors are at.”

Kai follows closely behind Yeonjun as they walk farther down the left hall. Passing by all the other rooms, Yeonjun stops at the last door on the right side and even before they could open the door, Kai could hear voices emitting from the slight crack of the ajared door.

Yeonjun silently pushes the door open wider and the two takes a moment to absorb the scene that was unraveling before them.

“Since when did being the tallest mean getting the automatic say in things?”

“Since I’m too tall for you to even be able to reach up to my face and fight me.”

“Bitch, I’ll fight your crusty kneecaps any time of any day—”

Before the peaceful conversation could escalate into a full on brawl, Yeonjun loudly cleared his throat, successfully diverting everyone’s attention on him and the guest by his side.

As soon as their eyes had landed on Kai, the other boys in the room stopped what they were doing and went over to give him a near suffocating hug, sandwiching him between their bodies. However, only one of the other boys stayed behind and watched. 

After they broke apart, one of them spoke and it was a blond, “I can’t believe we’re all actually here. I never thought we’d be back together again.”

Kai quickly looked both the boys up and down, widening his eyes in astonishment, “Beomgyu-hyung, Taehyun-ah. You guys haven’t changed one bit since the last time we saw each other.”

“It’s been way too long since we’ve gotten together again,” Taehyun says with a hint of sorrow laced in his voice.

“And you were the last one to get here so that means it’s between either me or Soobin-hyung who get the master bedroom,” Beomgyu added.

Taehyun took his eyes away from Kai to throw the blond a look. “I beat you all to the room first.”

“Soobin-hyung and I got to the mansion first. You came after us and literally ran right past us to this room.”

“So? That just proves you guys were too slow and that I should have this room.”

As the two boys continued arguing for another good minute or so, Kai looked past the two boys and noticed the tallest of them all was standing awkwardly besides the bed, trying his absolute hardest to maintain eye contact with the carpeted floors.

Truthfully, Kai hadn’t thought at all about what he’d say to him when they’d finally meet again and he was coming to regret that decision now. Turning his face away to ask Yeonjun more about the layout of the house, he realized that the older man had left his side to subdue the intense conversation and make sure no one gets hurt.

Deciding it was best not to meddle into an ongoing mini war that was going on between his friends, Kai stepped out of the room and dragged his suitcase alongside with him into the hall. The master bedroom was certainly appealing with its many fancy features to the room and much larger space, but Kai didn’t take much interest in that. Besides, being in a large room by himself already made him feel unease and slightly nauseous just thinking about it. 

Kai never been fond of staying anywhere in a large area by himself. There was just something about the vast space being left opened for the imagination to run wild and convince you a monster was just hiding somewhere nearby whether it be concealed in the darkness or hidden in plain sight.

As Kai walked slowly down the corridor, he stops at a random door and twists the door knob, opening the door to a smaller room.

Two twin sized bed was placed on opposite side of the room with a window decorating the wall in the middle of the room opposite from the door. Despite being a supposedly smaller room from the master bedroom, it still felt a lot spacious as there was no other furniture besides for a desk facing the window, a lamp, and two separate wardrobes.

Choosing the bed on the left, Kai sat his suitcase to the side and plopped himself tiredly onto the mattress that creaked softly below him. Kai nearly jumped out of bed when someone knocked on the door.

“Did I wake you?”

Kai’s mind went blank for a second before he finally snapped himself out of his frozen state and shook his head. "No,” he says gently, careful not to speak too loudly as if doing so would scare the other boy away. “Just resting. It was a long flight from Hawaii.”

The taller boy simply nodded in understanding.

Kai didn’t want to seem rude but when the boy continued standing in the same place, not uttering a single word, he thought that he should say something to relieve some of the awkwardness and tension that made up most of the atmosphere in the room.

“Do you need something, Soobin-hyung?”

As if realizing he wasn’t the only other person in the room, Soobin finally snaps his head up at Kai and hastily shook his head.

“No, no. Umm…”

Kai only tilts his to the side as he stared at the boy in confusion and curiosity.

Soobin finally brings himself to meet his eyes with Kai’s before revealing the truth to his sudden appearance, “Yeonjun-hyung and the rest decided that the master bedroom will belong to Taehyun while Yeonjun and Beomgyu will get their own separate rooms. And this is the only room left that has two beds so that officially makes us roommates.”

As if on cue, Kai suddenly remembered what he told himself earlier in the backseat of a cab as a pathetic excuse to cheer himself up:

_This is going to be fun. _He repeats to himself yet again. _I'll just be sharing a room with my ex-boyfriend who I've used to date in secret. _

_No big deal. Right?_


	2. Run Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If only walls could talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> after so long, I've finally updated this fic (;´Д`)

Kai was finding it difficult to sleep. No matter how many times he tossed and turned every which way, every position grew more uncomfortable. Perhaps he needed time to adjust to his new room or he just needed to get used to hearing the sound of the bed beneath him groan every time he moved, but he couldn’t bring himself to fall asleep despite how overwhelmingly tired he was.

After a couple of useless minutes trying to find the right position to fall asleep in, Kai eventually gave up and lay flat on his back, staring up at his new ceiling. It wasn’t that he felt uncomfortable with the other person sleeping on the other side of the room, but it was hard to focus on falling asleep when all he could concentrate on was the sound of his ex-boyfriend’s soft breathing as he slept soundlessly and peacefully like a baby.

It’s been seven years since they’ve last seen each other after the breakup and neither knew how to react in each other’s presence again. When they broke up in a heated dispute, things didn’t quite end on a good note after they’d decided to part ways.

Seeing each other for the first time since then has taken a huge toll on Kai and all he wanted to do was to curl himself up into a ball and hide away from the rest of the world. 

Realizing that there was no use in trying to sleep in the state he was in, Kai sat up and planted his feet down onto the cold floorboards, pushing himself off the bed. His steps were soft as he was careful not to wake up the unconscious boy on the other side of the room. After successfully exiting the room and closing the door behind him, Kai allows a deep sigh to escape him as he proceeded to look around the corridor. 

After the boys had figured out their sleeping arrangement, they all had went downstairs to get wasted to kickoff the start of their summer vacation. The idea of being intoxicated right after his long flight didn’t seem very appealing to him, so Kai opted out and went to bed first while the rest drank themselves to sleep.

Kai made his way downstairs to the kitchen wanting to pour himself a glass of water. He search through all the cupboards until he found the cups and took a glass out. Walking to the sink, he turns the tap on and filtered water came pouring out into the glass.

  
  


He fills the glass with water until it reached the brim and he shut the tap off before bringing the glass to his lips and gulping it down. Kai sighs once again as he felt the cold water soothe his dry throat. He placed the empty glass into the sink and started heading his way back up to his room.

He stood at the top of the grand staircase and turned left in the direction of the bedroom corridor when he suddenly heard the faint sound of a door clicked shut behind him. Kai paused in his step and turned around at the sound. He waited a few seconds before calling out.

“Yeonjun-hyung? Is that you?”

The empty hall only answered him in silence. 

Thoroughly confused, Kai stared at the opposite hallway in curiosity. Instead of going straight back to his room, he walked in the opposite direction. Kai vaguely remembers the rooms that Yeonjun had told him was down on the other side of the house. He opens the first door to his right and saw that it was a small bathroom dimly lit by the moonlight that poured through the window. But no one was inside.

He closes the door promptly and proceed to the door across from the bathroom. What he saw was an office-looking room with two bookcases on one side of the room with a cozy looking armchair placed next to a small table. On the other half of the room was a large desk and a much larger painting hung on the wall behind it. Kai figured this was probably the private study room. Although the room was luxurious and profound, Kai found it odd that a painting of the mansion itself was kept. Yet, the room was deserted.

Kai moved on to the next door and stumbled upon the mini library. Rows of bookcases lined up on each side of the room that was double the side of the master bedroom. In the center lies a chaise lounge chair that tempted Kai with its deep, maroon, velvet-y cushion. Again, the room was isolated with the exception of the various books that filled up all the shelves and most of the empty spaces in the room.

When Kai got to the end of the hall, he spotted what must be the door to the attic on the ceiling. The cord to open the hatch on the ceiling swayed gently in the air, but Kai doubt anyone had gone up there. Kai was wholeheartedly confused at what could’ve been the sound he heard when he suddenly turned his head to the right and saw another hallway. 

Unlike the other hallways, there were no other doors except for a single, red door that can be seen at the end of the hall. The left side of the hall was decorated with windows that lined up throughout the corridor and the moonlight that shone through helped to light up the hallway.

He figured if no one was in the other rooms he looked through, then they must’ve gone down this way. It was the only logical explanation.

And so, he walked down the hall that almost seems to stretch on for eternity. Outside, the trees swayed with the wind and the sky was cleared. In the city, Kai was used to seeing starless skies due to the heavy pollution that filled the air. Being able to see the stars and the moon as clearly as he can now was a pleasant change in scenery.

What felt like years, Kai eventually stopped in front of the door painted over bright red. He grasp the knob of the door with one hand and twisted. The door refuses to move, so Kai tried turning the knob the other way. Despite his best effort, the door stubbornly stood in place and did not budge an inch. Kai quickly realized the door appeared to be locked.

He then tries knocking on the door and after waiting for more than a minute, the door still did not open. As a last resort, Kai got down on his knees and bent his body down low until his chest met the floor. He tried peeking through the crack beneath the door but could not see much of anything besides for the floorboards.

_ What? _

Kai was beyond confused at this point. It didn’t make sense. He knew he heard the sound of a door closing shut but he couldn’t find anyone occupying any of the other rooms or wandering around the halls. Kai slowly got up and stared dumbfoundedly at the red door.

Giving up, he sags his shoulders in defeat and turned around to head back to his room, drawing the conclusion that it must’ve just been his imagination. As he neared the end of the hall, he could’ve sworn he heard soft footsteps behind him and he quickly snapped his head around at the sound. The corridor was still isolated and nothing had changed apart from his increased paranoia. Though, if he was only a split second faster, he would’ve seen the shadow that peeked out from the crack beneath the door walk away.

Finally returning back to his room, Kai let his body collapsed onto his bed as fatigue quickly sedated him. After his mini search down the other corridors, Kai suddenly felt his tiredness increased by ten folds and he was ready to pass out like a light at any moment. 

It still bugged him endlessly that he couldn’t figure out the mystery behind who had closed the door, but he couldn’t find it in himself to think long and hard about it, for his lids were drooping with each passing second until eventually the ceiling above him began fading away and darkness consumed his vision.

* * *

When Kai had opened his eyes, he found that Soobin was gone and he was left alone in the room. The sunlight peeked through the curtains, illuminating the room in a soft morning glow which only made Kai want to fall back onto his pillow, pull the covers over his head and shut off from the world once again.

However, he knew he could not do that because it would only appear rude that he was invited by a friend who generously paid for his plane ticket and he couldn’t even get up to have a proper breakfast with them. With reluctance, Kai kicked the covers off his body and eventually force himself up to sit on his bed. He tries to rub the tiredness out of his eyes as he got up to grab a towel he found in the wardrobe and walked to the bathroom that was in the opposite corridor. After a brisk shower, Kai changed into a pair of loose shorts and a hoodie before making his way down the grand staircase and into the kitchen. 

Walking into the kitchen, Kai is greeted with a table full of fresh scrambled eggs, an assortment of fruits, bacon, toasts, and a glass of orange juice. The boys all sat around the table, greedily gobbling down each bite.

Noticing him standing in the doorway, Yeonjun beckons him over to join them. Kai walks over and chose the only seat that was available which was right next to Soobin. While he fills his plate with food, Kai listens silently to the conversation happening amongst his friends.

“Biochemistry is the science where chemistry is applied to the study of living organisms. It includes organic molecules and their chemical reactions. The study of the chemistry behind biological processes and the synthesis of biologically active molecules are the basic examples of biochem-”

Before he could finish, Taehyun was interrupted by giggles from all around the table and he looked across from him to see that Beomgyu had his head lazily hung back, pretending to sleep and snoring rather obnoxiously.

Taehyun narrowed his eyes in response. “That’s mature.”

Beomgyu lets out a chuckle before bringing his head back up to look at the younger. “I don’t understand how out of all the things you could’ve major in, you chose to major in _ biochemistry _.”

“You’re literally studying to become a veterinarian. Aren’t you basically studying the same thing as I am?”

“Yeah, but instead of biochem, I’m majoring in zoology which I later then have to earn a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree,” Beomgyu counteracts. He takes a mouthful of eggs into his mouth and swallowed before continuing, ”Besides, I get to be surrounded with animals trying to help them. Not use them as test experiments.”

Taehyun’s eye twitched slightly at the assumption. “I don’t think you fully understand how biochemistry work.”

Beomgyu shrugged. “Doesn’t matter,” he says through a mouthful of eggs.

“What about you guys?” Yeonjun quickly interjects. “You write, don’t you Soobin?”

Soobin swallows down his food before answering, “Mostly freelance. Sometimes I write articles for an online magazine and other times I’m self-publishing.”

“I know you’re really good at writing. Why don’t you just go to a publisher? They can really help get your work out there more and you’ll gain a lot more exposure. I can hook you up if you’d-“

As the boys took the morning catching up on each other’s lives, Kai unconsciously drones out their voices as he silently recalled what happened last night in his head. 

He barely had touched his food, not really finding himself to be all that hungry after remembering the voices from his dream, the creepy cab driver, the odd painting of the mansion, and most importantly, the strange, red door. Not to mention he still had a lot to think about concerning school, paying off his student debt, and more annoyingly, having to deal with living with his ex-boyfriend under the same roof, never mind in the same room.

He was so deep in thought that he hadn’t noticed the table falling silent or noticed his name was being called.

“_ Kai _.”

Hearing his name being called out in a sharp tone sent his head flying back up to face Yeonjun and away from the barely touched plate in front of him.

“Ah-I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

Kai saw the worried glances they all exchanged with one another but chose to ignore it.

“I was asking about what you’ve been up to for the last couple of years. Found a job? Still in school? Or perhaps...met someone special?”

_ God, no. _

“Oh, no, hyung. Nothing like that. I’m still in school,” he answered honestly. “I work part-time at a cafe I live nearby and I’m majoring in the department section of art. Nothing too exciting,” he says before taking a sip from his glass of juice.

Yeonjun throws him a disapproving look. “Don’t say that,” he chastised. “I remember how excited you were when you got accepted into one of the best art schools in America. There’s no doubt you’re really talented at what you do. It was an institute of the arts in California, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah,” he confirmed. “Unfortunately I couldn’t go due to some other issues going on at the time,” he said, avoiding his gaze from the others as he moved the food around on his plate mindlessly with his fork. “But the school that I go to is pretty good, too.”

The table fell silent once again and Kai held in the urge to excuse himself from the table to bury himself in a hole. Yeonjun opened his mouth to say something to clear the depressing atmosphere but was beaten to it by Kai.

“Do you know what’s inside that room with the red door?”

Not expecting a random question to be thrown at him, Yeonjun blinked his eyes in confusion as he stared back at the younger dumbfounded.

“What?”

“There’s a red door upstairs that’s connected to the opposite corridor of the bedrooms. I got up to get a glass of water and was walking back to my room when I heard a door closed behind me from the other corridor. But I didn’t find anyone wandering about.”

“You shouldn’t have been wandering the house in the middle of the night.”

Kai yelps in surprise, nearly fell off his seat when a stranger appeared behind him.

“Oh, Kai. I almost forgot to introduce you to Esme. She’s essentially the maid of the mansion. She’s been taking care of this place since…” Yeonjun spares a glance at Esme, trying to summon an answer out of her.

“Since I was old enough to learn how to hold a broomstick in both hands.”

“In other words, this is practically her home as well.”

Kai took a moment to take in the maid who stood in the doorway. She was a petite woman with thinning grey streak of hair. Her skin was frighteningly pale and Kai noted that he’s never seen someone look so old, they even had wrinkles on their wrinkles.

“Yes. Yes, that’s true but I don’t live here—have never set foot in the house past sundown even. I live with my husband and daughter farther down the road from here.”

  
  


Kai nodded in reply. “Hi, my name’s Kai. It’s nice to meet you.”

It suddenly made sense in his head. There was no way any of the boys actually woke up early enough to prepare a whole meal for all of them. 

“I’m serious about not wandering the house by yourself. If you’re not careful, you ought to get yourself lost—or much worse.”

Kai held Esme’s stare for a heartbeat longer.

“...Worse?”

As if realizing what she said, Esme shook her head and said, “Oh, I shall not say more. I best be on my way now. Lots of chores to tend to and errands to run. I’ll see you boys again in the morning, yes?”

“Thank you, Esme!” Yeonjun called out before she left.

Kai watched silently as the maid left hastily out of the kitchen. As soon as the maid was gone, Beomgyu looked back at the eldest before throwing questions at him. “So, when exactly was this mansion built? Do you know what happened to the previous owners?”

“If there’s anyone who knows this place best, it’s Esme. She’s been here all her life, so she probably knows the previous owners who used to live here.”

“Yeonjun hyung, you have the keys to all the rooms, don't you?” Taehyun asked.

Instead of answering him, Yeonjun stood up from his seat and walked over to the kitchen countertop to pull on the handle of a drawer. He reached inside and pulled out a rusted bronze key.

“Is that the key?”

“It’s _ a _ key. There’s, like, dozens more in here.”

Kai slumped his shoulders as Soobin sighed tiredly and Beomgyu exchanged glances with Taehyun.

* * *

After shoving the last key into the keyhole, Yeonjun hung his head down low before getting up from his kneeling position on the floor. He turned around to look at the rest of the boys before confessing, “The door remains locked.”

Beomgyu groaned as he turned away from the others. “We’ve been standing here for the past ten minutes watching you insert at least thirty keys into the door only so that not a _ single _ one of them works?”

Yeonjun lifted one brow up at the younger as he tossed the last key with the rest of the keys into a bowl. “As if you have anything to complain about when I was the one—”

“Are you sure that’s all the keys?” Soobin interrupted quickly.

“Positive.”

“If there’s no key for this door, then why didn’t the renovators just break it down?” Taehyun thought out loud.

Yeonjun shrugged his shoulders before answering, “My parents instructed that they wanted the house to still look almost exactly the way it was so, they kept it intact.”

Beomgyu scratched the back of his head in frustration. “This is annoying. How am I supposed to enjoy the rest of my vacation not knowing what’s behind this door?”

“Can’t we just break it down?” Taehyun suggested.

Beomgyu scoffed at the shorter boy. “Yeah, how exactly do you plan on doing that, genius?”

“It’s a wooden door, how durable can it really be after all this time?”

“Then go ahead and break it down yourself.”

“Beomgyu, don’t encourage him. He’ll probably break all the bones in his body.”

Taehyun gave Soobin a not-so-soft punch on the arm and the taller rubbed his sore arm, chuckling to himself. After a moment of simply standing around and observing the larger-than-most-averge-sized door, Yeonjun clasped his hands together.

“Now that we’ve tried our best here, we should head back down,” he said before bending down to retreive the bowl of keys and walking back down the corridor with Soobin, Beomgyu and Taehyun following on his trail.

“You brought the Nintendo Switch?” Taehyun looked at Beomgyu incredulously.

“Duh. How else am I supposed to prove that I'm the best Mario Kart player.”

“According to what source?”

“According to the match where I completely obliterate you.”

“So, no warm-up games this time, right?”

After the boys were completely out of sight, Kai turned his attention back to the red door behind him. Although he knew the door was locked, he still lifted his arm up to grasp the black door knob with one hand and gave it an experimental twist. Kai scoffed at himself for even trying when the door still didn’t open. Kai wasn’t exactly sure why he was still standing in front of a door that almost seemed to mock him with its obnoxiously bright, exuberant red color. 

_ A red door. Why would anyone paint a door red? _ Kai wondered to himself bitterly.

Before he decided that it was useless to still be standing around in front of a strange, mysterious door that annoyingly refuses to open, Kai brought his ear to the door, trying to listen for any sound. Honestly, Kai didn’t know what he was expecting to get out of this. He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on any vibration or any unusual sound that he might be able to hear. After a silent moment or two, Kai slumped his shoulders defeatedly and dragged his fingers down the door, creating little scatching noices against the rough surface. He tapped the door twice with his finger, thinking. Then Kai’s eyes immediately flew open. He threw himself away from the door, eyes still wide open in terror. Kai could hear his heartbeat through his ears and he wanted to run away but found himself rooted to the floor. 

Someone had tapped the door on the other side.

Kai loudly gasped when he heard someone spoke behind him. Spinning on his heels, Kai saw that it was Soobin who gave him a strange look.

“What are you doing?”

Kai had to blink a couple of times before trusting himself to speak without his voice coming out shaky.

“Nothing.”

As if sensing his unease, Soobin face turned soft as he spoke, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I was just wondering why you’re still up here.”

Now that he was finally faced with the older alone without any of the other boys around, Kai immediately noticed how much more tense the atmosphere became. He really wanted to tell him about what had happened behind the red door but truthfully, he didn’t feel like talking to his ex-boyfriend at all. An awkward silence lingered between them before Soobin opened his mouth to speak.

“I didn’t think you’d actually show up,” he admitted softly to the younger.

Kai was barely thinking before the words had already left his mouth, “Yeah, well, at least I don’t run away from all my problems.” Kai mentally cringed to himself and slapped himself in his head. 

“Is that what you thought what’d happened?”

“If it happened, then doesn’t that make it true?” Kai bit his tongue inside his mouth in an attempt to stop himself from adding more fuel to the fire. Just as he thought the older was going to retort back, Soobin simply pursed his lips together and turned his back to Kai, proceeding to walk away. Kai didn’t know why, but all of a sudden, a slow drawn out anger blossomed in the pit of his stomach and he drew his brows together as he watched Soobin walk away from him.

“Typical.”

Soobin stopped in his tracks upon hearing the single word leave the younger’s mouth. He turned around to face Kai once again.

“What?”

“You’ve always had a habit of running away. Looks like nothing has changed but are we really surprised?” Kai said, his words leaving a bitter taste in his mouth.

“And what about you?”

Kai didn’t say anything, watching the older with narrowed eyes.

“You say I always run away? At least I actually _ cared _ about keeping our relationship and didn’t break up because I felt like it was the only choice.”

Kai almost laughed at the older's statement.

“That’s bold, hyung. No matter how many times I’ve tried, you never told me anything. Not a single word. Who knows, maybe I just got tired.”

“Was that the problem?”

“The problem was that you only thought about yourself.”

“The problem was that _ you _ gave up on _ me _!”

“And it’s fair that you get to give up on me first?”

Before Soobin could open his mouth to reply, their conversation was cut short as they were interrupted by the harsh, pounding knocks that came from behind the red door. The noise was so loud that it sounded like thunder booming to Kai’s ears.

Immediately, Kai yelped loudly and jumped farther back away from the door, clutching onto Soobin’s arm by instinct. They stared silently watching the red door vibrate when the door all of a sudden had abruptly stopped being pounded on and the corridor fell into silence. 

Neither of the two boys said anything at first, clearly still in shock. Kai still had his hands clutched around Soobin’s arm, nails digging through his skin, but the older didn’t flinch nor seem to mind.

Finally, after Soobin felt his heart slowed down, he turned his head to look at the younger.

“Is this a good time to run away now?”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapt has actually been half written for the longest of time already as I was more interested on other projects I was working on but I swear I haven't forgotten about this fic! Thank you for reading this chapter and I hope to get the next update out asap to make up for lost time~

**Author's Note:**

> *gasps* and they were roOmAtEsss
> 
> So there was that! What's the history behind the mansion? Who lived here before them? What's the history between Soobin and Kai? More will be revealed in the next chapter!
> 
> side note: the theories for txt upcoming comeback got me fucked up. Bh basically gave us sanctuary and Arcadia photo concepts and said "eat up. this is your breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the next two weeks bITCHES." Not to mention the CRAZY promotions bh has been doing in South Korea with placing their faces literally EVERYWHERE from large screen monitors all over malls and filling an entire subway with promo. It's fucking insane with how much money they're putting into their 1st cb and going all out (probably to make up for the long delay). So with that in mind, let's do our part doing the bare minimum at least by streaming, collecting points, voting, and helping them climb higher on social chart. Fighting moas!! <333


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